Funding a family of 15 in Flores in survival mode - #Covid19Heartbreak.

Our great friend Robert is from Flores, an Island in Indonesia (Next to Komodo Island).

He has a big family there along with a little boy, he moved to Bali by himself to earn a better income to send money to his family back home and support them better.

Working as a taxi driver there he made sufficient income to do this however due to Covid 19 he had to return home. Flores is a gorgeous Island and heavily relies on tourism but all boats have been restricted going into the Island and there is obviously no tourism coming in for the foreseeable future, their Island is literally cut off from making any income.

Their family land has a very basic agri setup but not enough to keep them self sufficient.

In his house there are 15 of them sleeping on mats on mud floors, they have an outdoor bathroom which is set amongst coconut and banana trees. The family would make small profits from exporting coconuts and banana's to Bali but as there are no boats going they've been eating anything from their plantation thats ripe but they are getting low!

Robert has stacked up a debt of $200AUD from buying rice at a local market over a period of time and has now been declined to buy any more.

5 of his family members are currently very sick, he has run out of formula for his boy and Robert along with some of his family hadn't eaten anything in four days !!

With medicine being so costly to obtain and running so low on food Robert reached out to us with much embarrassment. I need to be clear when I say this, his messages weren't just an every day cliche "hoax / hustle". He has never asked anything from us before. We even offered to buy him food when we were with him and he would always politely decline.

All our times with Robert as our taxi driver he charged us nothing above average, if anything - we got an absolute bargain and he looked after us more than just a taxi driver, he became our tour guide, security guard and ultimately great friend.

For those of you who haven't heard myself and my family boast about him when coming back from Bali, he genuinely is the most humble young lad we've all ever met.

He is living such a different life to most of us, having Havaiana thongs or being with his family is the most luxury he experiences - controversial I know, but he doesn't even have a passport or I.D's etc. All of that mandatory admin for us is far too expensive for him but he's never worried about that, nothing is a problem for Robert. He has a very simple way of living. Except for now.

There is no social security system in Indonesia, so many people are starving to death. Now he has exhausted everything and they are literally in survival mode.

My mum called me in tears and i cried too reading his messages reaching out - you can honestly feel his desperation in his words trying to help his family survive.

Mumsy has been an absolute saint and has already sent over 2 rounds of money to support him but because there are 15 of them and they are so isolated everything is expensive and that money is nearly gone.

We worked out that they need $3 a day each to step out of malnutrition so the $1,500 would last the whole family for one month. We are hoping that enough contributions flow in so that they can purchase some chooks for eggs, a net for fishing and soyabean seeds to grow their own. This is sustainability and we can help them achieve this.

- If you cannot contribute that is absolutely fine but please share this so others maybe can.

Thanks for your time friends, one love xx